New Delhi, Jan 9 (UNI) Confederation of All India Traders on Thursday urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi for a meeting prior to his proposed meet with e commerce giant Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to apprise him about factual position on 'how Amazon and Flipkart are destroying the business of small traders of the country'.

Flipkart is a leading destination for online shopping in India while Amazon is an American multinational technology company based in Seattle that focuses on e-commerce, cloud computing, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence.

In the wake of visit of the Amazon CEO to India and his likely meeting with Mr Modi, the CAIT in a communication sent to Prime Minister, urged for a meeting to apprise him about the factual position on the critical issue.

'Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos' eagerness to meet Prime Minister is certainly to shield unfair business activities in e commerce by Amazon and to justify violation of FDI policy of the Government by Amazon in a clandestine manner,' the trade body said in its communication.

CAIT National President B C Bhartia and Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal reminded the Prime Minister that about two months back, CAIT had made complaint with relevant evidences to Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal against malpractices of Amazon and Flipkart.

Taking immediate cognisance of the serious charges, Mr Goyal took the matter with all seriousness and directed the officials concerned to probe the complaint and has categorically assured several times that no one will be allowed to violate the FDI policy.

Mr Bhartia and Mr Khandelwal said that it was a matter of grave concern that malpractices of e commerce companies -- prominently Amazon and Flipkart -- has greatly hurt the business of small traders across the country.

Their collusion with brand companies and banks have compelled the closure of thousands of small traders dealing in Kirana shops, mobile, electronics, electrical items, fashion apparel and readymade garments, they said.

The CAIT reiterated that traders of the country are not against the e commerce and rather CAIT is engaged in multi-activities under PM's visionary "Digital India" mission and aligning the traders with e commerce business by creating individual e store of every trader.

'However, for proving an equal level playing field, we are of the considered opinion that e commerce companies like Amazon and Flipkart should be compelled to comply with every provision of FDI policy and not to avoid liability of GST and Income Tax, which they are consistently doing by artificially lowering the prices and causing great loss of tax revenue to the Government,' it maintained.

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